Today I found myself heading out to the city, and didn’t get to my computer this evening. My usual morning routine on the computer, such as uploading photos, checking the trail cam files and writing a blog post, got completely skipped.

Imagine my surprise when I had a moment to log on and discovered a big spike in visits and views! To those of you popping by from City Steading Brews, welcome! Another welcome to all those who found their way here to check out my posts about doing things crab apples. It’s definitely the season for it! I hope what you’re finding is useful.

Normally, I post at least one photo with my blog posts, but today I hadn’t taken a single photo! Which is very unusual for me. 😁

So, I instead went back a few days and put this together for you to enjoy.

It has nothing at all to do with anything I did today, but it’s cute kittens, so who cares?

They absolutely loved it while I was raking up that pile of grass clippings – and made it a real challenge to not accidentally rake up a kitten, too!

With things working out for my daughter being able to pay the vet bill for Leyendecker, we no longer needed to delay our city trip to continue stocking up. Today is Labour Day weekend, but a lot of places were open for at least short hours. I was not going to do Costco yet, but was going to try one of the other wholesale places I sometimes go to – only do discover it was closed! I still went to the international grocery store that I planned on, making a quick stop at a nearby Dollarama, then hit a Superstore. This time of year, a lot of places have case lot sales that I took advantage of. More stuff for the pantry, as we work on the assumption that we will have at least two months this winter, stuck at home due to weather conditions.

A couple of years back, a daughter and I would make these trips and do all the shopping in one day. Since then, we’ve added a couple more regular stores to shop at, and have split things up into two, sometimes three, trips. Thankfully, gas prices have been slowly going down. We’re currently at 165.9 cents per litre locally, though I did see one place in the city that was at 157.9 It’s still way too high, though. I put $40 of gas in my tank on the way to the city, and it gave me just over a quarter tank. I’m saving the fill for when I get to Costco, where the price will be better.

So, aside from stopping at the gas station, I went to three different stores, with two of them right next to each other.

It still left me totally drained. It doesn’t seem to matter how much I pace myself, whether or not I had an energy drink, or took a break for lunch. These trips just leave me exhausted. Being around so many people sucks the energy right out of me.

How on earth did I manage to keep going, when we were still living in the city? I was so involved in things, too. I now realize I must have been running on fumes for years. My mother often goes on about how we need to get out and around people more. Which makes sense coming from her. My mother spent some 40+ years here on the farm, raising 5 kids, growing a huge garden, and doing all the things that comes with running a “subsistence farm”, as it was called back then. Mind you, I do remember quite a lot of visits from their friends in the city, and attending social events, so it’s not like they were hermits. Still, once my mom moved to where she is living now, she had a lot more social opportunities right in her building, never mind the stuff in walking distance for her. My mother is a social person.

I’m not.

She, of course, thinks I should be. She especially brings it up when she wants me to drive her around all over the place, and/or stay at her place for hours, and I point out I have things to do at home. That’s when I get told how I need to be around people! I am allowed to take a holiday every now and then!

She has no idea just how people’d out I still am. I’ve tried to tell her about all the various things I was involved in before we moved here – things which often included a lot of conflict – but it’s completely beyond her experience, so she doesn’t quite get it.

These trips to the city remind me just how much I am NOT a city person, even after all those decades off the farm. I’m not a people person. It’s not that I don’t like people. I just don’t like being physically around lots of them for too long.

It makes me appreciate being where we are now, that much more. Even if it means dealing with our vandal, or getting snowed in repeatedly, or all the vehicle troubles, or living in a house that needs a top to bottom renovation (but I’ll be happy with just a new roof!), and struggling to keep the garden alive, or cleaning up the place with all the working equipment gone before we got here…

It’s still better than what we left behind. We have quiet. We have space. There is so much less stress. And I love the work that I’m able to do here, even if I have to resort to fairly primitive means to get things done.

There’s a reason I haven’t changed my tag line after being here for almost 5 years.

Sometimes, you really do need to go back, to go forward.

The Re-Farmer